Dear Editor,
I am telling you this story because the City of Kimberley appears to be uninterested.
We had a sidewalk and it was a mess. It had cracks, it was uneven, it was a tripping hazard. But we used it. We used it a lot. We know our neighbours. We have street parties and potlucks. We use and live in our front yards.
Early in the summer we got a letter that our sidewalk was being removed. Not replaced. Removed. And the replacement was to be compacted gravel.
Citizens (tax-payers) were concerned. Citizens wrote letters to operations and roads and contacted the people they were told to contact. Sometimes there were replies, but most of the time there was silence.
We were told we could pay for a new sidewalk ourselves and an exorbitant figure was thrown at us. No support or help was offered to proceed with finding out the actual cost.
So the citizens wrote to the Kimberley mayor and councillors. More than once. There was NO reply. Not one elected official bothered to reply to the emails.
Still in the midst of trying to find answers, the sidewalk removal commenced.
Our property sits lower than the street and despite numerous queries about how this would be handled, it was never addressed specifically and the final result was…compacted gravel… with no infrastructure to support it.
The street looks like a construction zone where the gravel edge has been left in a crooked and uneven mess. More than one person has asked, “What is going on here?” Aesthetics may not be of concern to the city, but it is of utmost concern to most home-owners.
I am pretty sure this is all about cost-saving; however, we are citizens (tax-payers) living in Kimberley and the fact that we were totally ignored by our elected officials is appalling.
Perhaps a cut in our taxes is in order since we no longer enjoy the infrastructure of the sidewalk and are left to deal with the aftermath of the great gravel influx.
Best small town in BC? I live in hope.
Thank you for the opportunity to express my anger and frustration.
Connie Jones
Kimberley, BC